Callirjonum.] cxix. POLYGONACE^E. (J. D. Hooker.) 23 



very slender branchlets, leaves most minute bristles at the distant nodes, 

 nuts oblong hard densely clothed with many series of branching intricate 

 rigid red-brown flexuous bristles. Boiss. FL Orient, iv. 1000. 



The PANJAB, EdgewortJi, Talbart ; Salt RangQ, alt. 2000 ft., Stewart. SCINDE, 

 Stocks; Boogtee Hills/ J r icary. DISTEIB. Persia, Armenia, Syria. 



Flowering branches about as thick as a crow-quill or less, internodes 1-1 in. long ; 

 pedicels - in. ; sepals about as long. Fruit |-1 in. diam. including the shaggy 

 branched bristles, nucleus about \ in. 



2. PTEROPYRUBX, Jaub. $ Spach. 



Eigid shrubs. Leaves small, alternate or fascicled, linear or spathulate ; 

 ochrea very short or obsolete. Flowers small, ochreate, 2-sexual. Sepals 

 5, subequal. Stamens 8. Ovary 3-angled, acuminate ; styles 3. Nut 

 broadly 3-winged, beaked. Seed beaked, base broad; embryo eccentric, 

 cotyledons oblong, short. Species 5-6, Western Asiatic. 



P. Oliyeri, Jaulj. fy Spach. 111. Plant. Orient, ii. 9, t. 108 ; leaves 

 fascicled thick glaucous obovate oblong spathulate or linear-oblong obtuse 

 nerveless, nut broadly 6- winged in two superposed series of wings, the lower 

 wings broadest. Meissn. in DC. Prodr. xiv. 1. 31 ; Boiss. Fl. Orient, iv. 

 1002 ; Wight Ic. t. 1809. P. Grimthii, Meissn. I. c, Alraplmcis &\>.,Aitchison 

 Cat. PL Panjab. 125. 



SCINDE, JZicary, Stocks. DISTEIB. Affghanistan, Persia. 



An excessively branched shrub, branchlets white. Leapes f-j in., margins often 

 recurved. Clusters many-fld., sessile ; flowers shortly pedicelled. Fruit in. 

 diam., nearly circular in outline; each angle of the nut with 2 superposed wings 

 brought about by the 3-gonous nucleus twisting as the wings grow, the effect of 

 which is that each vertical wing is as it were cut in two in the middle, and the upper 

 half of the wing of one angle alternates with the lower half of th-3 wing of another 

 angle. 



3. POXiYGONUXK, Linn. 



Herbs, rarely undershrubs. Leaves alternate, entire, rarely lobed ; 

 stipules tubular, membranous, rarely minute and 2-fid. Flowers 2-sexuai, 

 small or minute, clustered ; clusters axillary or terminal, bracteate and 

 bracteolate, axillary and sessile, or in spiciform capitate or panicled racemes ; 

 pedicel short usually jointed under the perianth; bracts and bracteoles 

 membranous, ochreate. Disk glandular or 0. Perianth 4-5- rarely 3-cleft, 

 2 outer sepals usually > smallest. Stamens 5-8, rarely 1-4, perigynous. 

 Ovary compressed or 3-gonous; styles 2 or 3, .free or combined below, 

 stigmas usually capitellate. Nut included in the more or less enlarged (rarely 

 fleshy) perianth, trigonous or biconvex. Seed albuminous ; embryo lateral, 

 radicle long, cotyledons small (rarely large), flat, accumbent, rarely incum- 

 bent. Species about 150, in all latitudes. 



A very troublesome genus, the Indian species of which have" been much con- 

 fused, and I cannot hope that I have finally settled the limits of those especially 

 of the Persicaria and Amcularia sections. Koenigia is regarded as a section of 

 Polygonum. 



KEY TO THE SECTIONS. 

 A. Stipules minute 2-partite. 



Sect. 1. KOJNIGXTA. A minute annual. Flowers in terminal clusters. Stigmas 

 subsessile. Nut subterete. Sp. 1. 



